DOHA: The Ministry of Administrative Development may review the working hours of ministries and government offices to help ease traffic congestion on Doha roads.
All government offices have about the same working hours and most of them are located in one part of the city.
This causes chaos on Doha roads in the mornings and early afternoons on weekdays.
School hours also clash with office hours of government departments, according to recommendations of a road safety panel.
The recommendations were recently discussed by the Advisory Council. The Council has decided to forward the recommendations to the government. They include suggestions for building multi-storey parking facilities at different locations in the city.
The recommendations ask the government to further restrict some categories of expatriates from acquiring driver’s licence.
Already, there is a ban on expatriates in several occupations on applying for and obtaining driving licence. However, the ban is not working effectively. Companies might be asked to provide transport to their employees to come to work and go back home.
Based on the recommendations, it may be made mandatory for the employees of bigger companies to use public transport to commute to work place and back home.
It has been suggested that commercial activities that remain concentrated in Doha, should be taken outside the city limits.
The road safety panel was asked by the Cabinet in late 2013 to prepare a study on traffic snarls on Doha roads.
Its recommendations were forwarded by the Cabinet in the form of a memorandum addressed to the Ministry of Municipality and Urban Planning, to the Advisory Council. The Council, at its weekly meeting on January 19 approved them for being referred to the government for implementation, Al Sharq reports.
One of the recommendations of the committee is to encourage the use of school transport. This would help ease congestion on city roads on weekdays, the panel said. Suggestions of the panel for long-term implementation include diverse geographical location of schools and assigning the work of road design to Qatar Engineering Association.
THE PENINSULA
